Album Review: Juffage – ‘Semicircle’

By
nmeJun 1, 2011

Computer music never sounded so humane, the fine workings of multi-instrumentalist Jeff T Smith

If Leeds artist [b]Jeff T Smith[/b] sounds like the stuff of Wire-reading, tape-looping nerds’ wet dreams, you’d be half right. He’s worked with Albini in Chicago, has an MA in computer music and plays every instrument on this debut.

But far from being sterile, it’s one of the warmer, more human records of the year: [b]‘HHV’[/b] and [b]‘Under Fanblades’[/b], with its plea “[i]maybe we could get there some day[/i]”, recall the lush, mournful drone of [b]Do Make Say Think[/b], and [b]‘Stop Making Music’[/b] the lonesome, ruined seaside shack haunting of [a]Grizzly Bear[/a]; [b]‘My Weakness’[/b] takes the clatter of [b]‘Desperate Youth…’[/b]-era TVOTR and tempers it with [a]Arcade Fire[/a]’s intimacy. It’s an album to be surprised by, and maybe even love.